CIESM SUB 1 cruise successfully completed
1 August 2005, CIESM News

The CIESM-SUB1 cruise left the port of Naples on July 21th 2005, with eighteen scientists on board the Univertitatis coming from four Mediterranean countries and different research institutes. The cruise ended on July 30th when the ship returned to Naples after 10 days of "excellent work", to quote Dr. Giorgio Budillon, Chief Scientist of the mission.

The CIESM-SUB1 cruise is the first survey studying, through a multidisciplinary approach, the main diversity patterns of a poorly investigated area of the Mediterranean Sea: the deep Southern Tyrrhenian area up to the Sardinia-Sicily Channels. This zone is an excellent place to study the complex dynamics of water exchanges and biological fluxes between the eastern and western Mediterranean sub-basins.

Among other findings, the cruise confirmed a salting and warming of the deep water layers, and completed the multibeam mapping of the sea bottom, including sea mounts. A large number of biological and microbiological samples were collected from representative sites as well: once analysed, they will cast light on the biodiversity of the deep Mediterranean Sea in one of its least known corners (check this website for future reports).

Check map and daily logs of the Universitatis CIESM SUB1 campaign.